sorabol

san francisco, ca

website

after breakfast at the ferry building i walked over to union square to do some shopping. having learned my lesson from my last visit to the westfield shopping center, i went back to tina's food court recommendation - korean food at sorabol. i'm pretty sure they cook the bulgogi in butter. according to jinny, that's how real koreans cook, anyway.

in an attempt to be healthy, i decided to add some spicy tofu, which was good but uninteresting. next time i'll just get extra bulgogi. the kimchee is free - grab a few containers when you get to the end of the line. good flavor to the kimchee, it adds the right amount of acidity to match the buttery bulgogi. there's probably better korean food in the city somewhere else, but sorabol is a great option if you get hungry while shopping.

coriander gourmet thai

san francisco, ca

link to yelp

normally when i go to the westfield mall's food court, i stop by tina's favorite spot for korean food. but since we had just eaten kimchee fried rice at the ferry building, i decided to try the thai food. not good. the tofu was overcooked and dry. the green beans and the pad thai were bland. the food court at the westfield mall has many many better options.

korean bbq

palo alto, ca

link to yelp

yes, that is apparently the name of the restaurant. which is somewhat descriptive because they do serve korean food, some of which was probably barbecued earlier in the day. it's tucked away in a corner of town & country mall. in fact, we had been to town & country at least a dozen times before and we had never seen it. derek found it on the internet when he was searching for korean food.

the restaurant is basically a buffet of pre-cooked korean food, most of which gets nuked in the microwave before they serve it to you. you choose two entrees and two ban chan for your plate. i went with the japchae (noodles), bulgogi, crab seafood salad and kimchee. the food isn't great - the bulgogi is a bit dry and the japchae is a little bland, but it's basically the quality that you would expect from a fast food korean buffet spot in a mall. (although the korean in the westfield san francisco mall is much better).